dominical trips

In March 2010, my husband, twin 11-year old boys, and I took our third trip to Costa Rica in four years. Previously, we’ve been to the Osa, Puerto Viejo de Sarapiqui, Arenal, and Puerto Viejo de Talamanca. For this 9 day trip, we spent 2 days in Manuel Antonio, 2 days at Rafiki Safari on the Rio Savegre, and 4 days in Dominical. 

*Thurs March 11, Arrived in San Jose, picked up rental car at Tricolor, and drove to Manuel Antonio on the new highway with short stop for an OK lunch at Wahoo’s soda in Jaco. We didn’t get the chance to get colones at an ATM before settting out on our trip, and I didn’t realize the new highway was a toll road. Surprisingly, they even took US dollars at the toll booths in Costa Rica. 

*In Manuel Antonio, we stayed at La Posada, which was a great place to stay. Despite being about 20 yards from the entrance gate to Manuel Antonio National Park, La Posada bungalows were very quiet and quaint. Each morning, they serve a breakfast which was plentiful and delicious. The walk to the beach from La Posada was about 3 minutes, and the hotel had boogie boards and snorkel masks for use by its guests. The staff at La Posada was also extremely helpful. Unfortunately, we didn’t figure out that the air conditioning in our rental car was not working until we were already close to Manuel Antonio. I was having some trouble communicating with the person on the phone at Tricolo, given my Spanish is not great and his English was so-so. Esteban of La Posada was extremely helpful and helped me communicate with Tricolor that our expectation was for them to bring us a new rental car that evening. Which Tricolor did…driving a car all the way from their office in San Jose and delivering it to us at La Posada. Right at La Posada, we saw squirrel monkeys each afternoon at about 2:30. One morning at breakfast, a very calm deer also showed up. And one afternoon, I saw a couple of toucans while I was sitting by the pool at La Posada. That evening, we had dinner at El Avion, the airplane restaurant. The food was very good, it had great views at sunset, and good batidos (fruit shakes).

*Friday March 12-This morning, we took a guided tour of Manuel Antonio National Park with Juan Brenes. Juan was an excellent guide. I would definitely recommend him. Besides spotting and pointing out wildlife, which we would never have seen without him, I loved him telling my 11 year olds how he became a successful guide, starting out with washing dishes in a restaurant from 4 p.m to 2 a.m. when he was their age. On the tour, we saw 2 three-toed sloths, 1 two-toed sloth, 3 or 4 howler monkeys, an agouti, popoo bird, white-necked heron, various spiders and lizards. I was kind of surprised that we didn’t see more wildlife. For some reason, I got the impression that Manuel Antonio Park was just brimming with wildlife, and to be honest, I feel like I saw more wildlife in terms of quantity and variety in the Osa. After finishing our tour, we went into Quepos for lunch at Soda Sanchez, which I would also recommend. After an afternoon of boogie boarding and body surfing, we went to Agua Azul. This is one of the best restaurants I’ve ever eaten at in Costa Rica. We thought the prices were pretty high ($10 for a hamburger and fries, $15 for a burrito), but then when our food arrived, we realized why. The portions were HUGE. The hamburger was the biggest I’ve ever seen, and 2 people could easily share one meal here. Their menu also has more “gourmet” type items.